Ah, the first of the “ber” months and, well, practically the start of the Christmas season here in the Philippines. Aside from the Earth, Wind, Fire song titled September, the month also offers fun facts that many people may not know of.
So, for this week’s #TIL: Today I Learned, we will let you in on some trivia bits about September. Now, this list may not answer why Green Day would want you to wake them up when it ends; we would at least know a little bit more about why we are very excited about September. Maybe it is high time you did too!
#TIL: Seven
Septem, the first two syllables of September, actually means seven in Latin. Any idea why it is called September? No? Well, that is because, in the Ancient Roman calendar, September is the seventh (Septimus) month of the year, starting in March. The addition of two more months, January and February, explains why September is the ninth month of the year and not the seventh. It is also the first of the months named after their numerical position. That’s right! Octo for eight, Novem for nine, Decem for tenth.
#TIL: Nine
Photo from Love Meow
We all know that September is the ninth month in the Gregorian calendar. Coincidentally, September also has the most letters out of all the months in the year, nine, to be exact. Now, some of you may not have been born yet when 9-9-99 occurred. It was the closest and the most nines some of us have experienced. 9-9-999, the next string of nines will happen in 7,978 years, when all numbers of the date will be nine.
#TIL: 29 Days
We are not talking about the Leap Year here. In the Roman calendar, September only had 29 days. When Julius Caesar introduced the Julian calendar in 46 BCE, he added ten more days to the year and introduced the leap day, which occurs in February, nearly every four years.
Additional trivia, all leap years must be divisible by 100, which means the next leap year will be in 2024.
